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hello welcome to another week of extra
credits thanks to you guys our inbox has
been filling up pretty rapidly with
questions and future topic suggestions
in fact we've gotten so many questions
that we've decided to devote an
occasional episode to answering several
at a time this will give us a chance to
address the most popular questions and
discuss topics that we don't need an
entire episode to cover so let's get
this first mailbag episode underway hey
James you got the bag sweet okay
when is this flood of samey first-person
shooter games going stop they're all so
generic and bland this is probably the
number one most asked question in our
inbox
let's give it a proper answer the
obvious reason we're seeing so many of
these games every year it's because of
how popular the genre has become games
like Halo and modern warfare of breaking
sales records all over the place and
even lame first-person shooters are
selling a decent amount these days if a
game studio is looking for a low-risk
project it's pretty much a no-brainer
right now besides which there are some
incredibly advanced tools out there for
making these games the Unreal Engine is
an amazing tool for building
first-person shooters and it's
practically ready to use right out of
the box no other genre has a publicly
available tool like that at least not
yet this has made first-person shooters
the easiest kind of game to get to at
least double a status so you can imagine
why the market feels so flooded lately
but I think it's helpful to maintain
some perspective here I know it seems
like the FPS genre is nothing but a
stagnating pile of Halo and modern
warfare knock-offs right now but that
largely depends on how you define
first-person shooters if you define the
genre as games like Call of Duty and
Halo then yes of course the genre by
definition feels samey and slow to
evolve but if you include all games
based around first-person shooting the
selection suddenly looks a lot more
diverse Bioshock fallout 3 Team Fortress
2 fallen earth portal stalker metro 2033
savage - that's a much more interesting
variety don't worry though eventually
some new genre will take off and we'll
have a new flood of games to get stuck
of all right one down next how do I get
a job in the game industry another
popular request
we're probably gonna try to do an
episode on this eventually but it's a
really hard topic to condense into six
minutes we're working on it until then
I'll just throw out some quick tips one
know the specific kind of job you want
to do to find a school with a good
reputation for teaching that job DigiPen
and USC are good place
is to start looking three Network
seriously this is one of those
industries where knowing people makes
all the difference make business cards
email people go to GDC and strike up
conversations keep in touch with
classmates seriously this industry is
smaller than it looks and getting your
foot in the door will be far easier if
you have friends on the inside for get
an internship as soon as possible the
summer of your sophomore year is not too
early five don't apply for a job you
don't want just for the hope of breaking
into the industry and changing positions
yes sometimes it works but just spare
yourself trust me your life will be
better for it what do you think of my
game idea several of you have emailed us
your own design concepts and game ideas
hoping to get a professional opinion
from James unfortunately James is
legally obligated to not look at any of
them I know it sucks but it's a
liability issue say he did look at an
idea that someone submitted and then one
day a game he worked on included
elements that were kind of similar to
that person's idea even if it was a
complete coincidence that person could
potentially sue him or his clients just
messy sorry we can't be more help there
next where can I get that outro music
I'm glad you asked the majority of the
music I use for the end credits can be
downloaded free of charge and
overclocked remix if you love games
music and game music and haven't checked
this place out remedy that immediately
for those few remixes I use that can't
be found on OCR I always put the song
title in the closing credits so a quick
Google search should do the trick enjoy
what do you guys actually do like what's
your actual game industry experience
fair question I have an animator at
Pixar Canada Alison is a freelance
artist who has done work for numerous
game studios and James well as he would
put it he gallivants he's worked as a
game designer in the triple-a industry
he's run his own in the most studio and
now he runs a consulting firm he's
worked on everything from call of duty
to farmville he also teaches master
level classes at DigiPen and in his free
time well he doesn't have any seriously
though
dude's been around what are your
thoughts on 3d gaming honestly we're a
bit skeptical I can think of only one
example of 3d and film where the
technology really added to the
experience and I have yet to see a 3d
game succeed in that regard if 3d
technology is going to take off it's
going to have to prove that it can help
the player get lost get immersed in the
experience
rather than distracting from it by
making the player aware of the
technology and then there's the cost of
entry sure the 3ds won't be too
expensive but that's because it uses
parallax barrier technology which
requires the user to be in a very
specific location in relation to the
device for it to work that's not a
feasible solution for home consoles at
this point how many people are gonna be
willing to pay for Sony's 3d experience
even if you already own a ps3 now you
need the right kind of TV and those
glasses aren't cheap or fashionable for
that matter
overall you're looking at thousands of
dollars because if the PlayStation 3 has
ever been lacking in any way it's that
the hardware wasn't expensive enough
what's happening to PC gaming is it dead
or just dying local PC gaming is hurting
these days because it's relatively
complex and expensive for the player
compared to consoles if you want to do
it right
you're gonna need a multi-thousand
dollar machine yeah I know you can do it
for cheaper if you really put in the
effort but it's hard to compete with the
cost and convenience of paying a few
hundred bucks for a console once every
few years my point is that one really
has to invest in being a PC gamer and
the range of people who are willing and
have the technical know-how to do so has
become relatively narrow and with game
budgets getting so big that smaller
audience isn't quite as appealing a
market anymore but that said the PC is
actually having a pretty good year sieve
5 just came out Starcraft 2 is finally
here and Diablo 3 is on the horizon
empire total war this year Shogun total
war next year a new world of warcraft
expansion by christmas and apple
products are finally getting some love -
which i think is a promising sign the PC
may not be on top of the world but I
don't think it's anywhere near dying and
really this question kind of depends on
your definitions as well if you factor
in mmo's social games flash games and
the occasional indie hit PC gaming is
actually kicking ass right now why has
the JRPG genre gotten so stagnant lately
well for both the American and the
Japanese game industry's games have
become very expensive to make which has
led to fewer risks being taken which has
led to stagnation and the JRPG genre has
definitely been affected but while many
people say that the entire genre is in
decline I don't think that's exactly
true I think that there are actually
only a handful of JRPG companies we
really care about and two of the biggest
ones merged years ago when I say JRPG
what's the first company that springs to
mind exactly I think we tend to use
Square Enix as a barometer for the
entire JRPG market so when they have a
bad year or turn out
your lackluster titles we take it as a
sign the JRPGs are all going downhill
this is a mistake on our part for two
reasons
a square-enix has lost a lot of their
best people over time and B they only
turn out a few games a year
I think the JRPG is going through a
period of realignment right now the
traditional Final Fantasy X games we're
accustomed to haven't kept up with the
time so well and are getting too
expensive to make but there are still
incredible jrpg is coming from smaller
studios like Nippon Ichi and Atlas
exciting quality stuff like persona 4
Valkyria Chronicles Demon Souls all
innovative games and from a genre that's
supposedly the most stagnant in the
Japanese industry I think we're gonna
see a big market shift for JRPGs in the
next couple years and I think games like
these are a hint at the variety of
places that genre can still go as the
escape is giving you guys a time limit
or something nope they pretty much let
us run wild but we've all got jobs and
lives arguably so we try to limit
ourselves to a running time that we can
manage the longer we make an episode the
more stress we put on Allison's work we
so James and I try to keep each episode
as time efficient as possible we do have
a lot of great stuff we're looking
forward to talking about though religion
in games achievements voice acting
piracy social games license titles and
quality sequels casual vs. core plus all
those diversity related topics we hinted
at last week and as you keep emailing us
your questions that list continues to
grow we really do appreciate the way you
guys have gotten involved thanks for
watching and we'll be back with a new
topic next week see ya
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